Giving a pond presentation; what to include?

[Lardeelion]

I just completed taking the West Virginia Master Gardener course, which was a lot of fun. I have to give a power point presentation to finish the class, and of course I'm doing ponds.

I've got about 25 slides and my main focus is making the other gardeners aware that ponds are a) awesome and fun and b) an entire ecosystem that requires dedication and maintenance. Since these are master gardeners, I imagine they'll be most interested in aquatic plant life. I want to be sure to include fish info too, so that people don't just think it's easy to go home and dig a hole and throw in a koi.

What would you have liked to know about before you started ponding? I'm going to assume that my audience has no knowledge of ponds.

I've got slides on:

Construction
Filtration
Bacteria 101
Plant Life
Fish and their requirements
Bog filter options
A gentle advisory about time, expense and maintenance

Can anybody think of anything else, general or specific, I should throw in there? Maybe a warning about koi vs goldfish? I'm so enthusiastic about this topic that I could go way overboard. Also, would anybody volunteer a photo of their pond, pond plants, filtration system, fish or bog for me to use in my presentation? I have found plenty from permissible sources but something constructed by "real people" would be neat.

This is so much cooler than my 10th grade presentation on the Battle of Bunker Hill....

 

[taherrmann4]

Are you going to talk about different types of pumps (internal vs external)?

Area with trees you may want to talk about adding a skimmer?

Depth for keeping koi or depth needed for your zone to keep fish from freezing (you may have this in the requirements)

What about the wildlife and other small creatures that may show up (Frogs, snails, snakes, ducks, birds, herons etc)

 

[dieselplower]

Since it is a master gardener course you should consider working in aquaponics or whatever it called, where you take the waste produced by fish and flow it into a bog where you can filter the water through gravel, keeping the poop in the bog, to be used to grow food.

 

[Dave 54]

Both koi and goldfsih hav a long and interesting history dating back thousands of years you could tell them a brief history about them both
Anotherthing you could take them hrough is plantst hat are poisonous to our fish see list :-

http://www.koi-pond-guide.com/toxic-plants.html

Throw in a little about the age they get too goldfish 40 years koi 70 + years if looked after correctly perhaps throw in the tale of hanaku born 25 years before the signing of the US constitution living until the 1970's
What about Aquatic plant varieties etc

Dave

 

[Lardeelion]

Since it is a master gardener course you should consider working in aquaponics or whatever it called, where you take the waste produced by fish and flow it into a bog where you can filter the water through gravel, keeping the poop in the bog, to be used to grow food.

That's an excellent suggestion.

 

[Lardeelion]

Are you going to talk about different types of pumps (internal vs external)?

Area with trees you may want to talk about adding a skimmer?

Depth for keeping koi or depth needed for your zone to keep fish from freezing (you may have this in the requirements)

What about the wildlife and other small creatures that may show up (Frogs, snails, snakes, ducks, birds, herons etc)

Yeah, I thought I'd briefly mention pump types, and definitely a slide about picking a spot for the pond and trees, which leads to the skimmer topic.

 

[timvz]

Your presentation might be a good read for many people here too! I for one would love to see it when your done.

 

[Lardeelion]

I can arrange that.

 

[Mmathis]

Maintaining good water quality (and what good water quality entails), as well as how you have to be patient and wait for Mother Nature to do her thing. A healthy pond doesn't happen over night.

Oh, and DO YOUR RESEARCH before you dig that hole and start adding fish! One of the most frustrating posters a while back was some girl who had something like a 300 gal pond FULL of fish (koi, I believe), and couldn't understand why they were sick & dying -- and she didn't want our opinions, either. Becky had to kick her off the forum! Really sad!

Oh, and good luck with your presentation!

 

[Lardeelion]

That's at least 4 slides, Mmathis! One has the phrase, "Are you sure you want a pond?"